


Land of Frost and Fluff

by NoBrandHero



Category: Homestuck
Genre: Cuddling & Snuggling, Established Relationship, F/M, Fluff, Flushed Romance | Matesprits, Post-Sburb/Sgrub, Snow
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-14
Updated: 2014-05-14
Packaged: 2018-01-24 20:04:11
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,115
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1615373
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/NoBrandHero/pseuds/NoBrandHero
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Karkat's never been in snow before and Jade doesn't know that the snow on LOFAF was not a good indicator of what winter weather really feels like. They find out the hard way that coats and layers are a bit essential to exploring a frozen backyard.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Land of Frost and Fluff

She should have been used to waking to screeching by then, she really should have.

Jade didn't consider herself a late sleeper, but Karkat had a way of waking earlier than her every day anyway. Sometimes she'd wake at four in the morning to him snuggled next to her with a novel in hand and there were some nights she suspected he never slept at all.

This time he was up at the crack of dawn to panic at the window.

Jade propped herself up on an elbow and yawned. "What's wrong, Karkat? Did a bird poop in the driveway?"

"This sure as _fuck_ ," he jammed a finger against the glass, "had better not be bird shit!"

She couldn't see anything from the bed, but it seemed awfully bright outside for how early it was, not to mention silent -- Karkat's yells notwithstanding. She fumbled for her glasses on the nightstand and slid out from the blankets. She shivered, as was becoming habit anymore; she'd regretted leaving the warmth of the bed every morning for the last two weeks.

She furrowed her brow once she had a non-blurry view out the window: white tufts were wafting past outside and Karkat was glaring daggers at them.

She gasped and ran closer. The neighborhood was coated in at least three feet of snow. It was so thick that she couldn't even see where the yards ended and the streets began. Best of all, it was still falling.

"Oh my gosh, I didn't know we were getting snow today!" She clapped her hands in excitement, hopping on the balls of her feet.

Karkat's nose wrinkled. " _Snow_?"

"You know _snow_. My planet was covered in the stuff!"

" _So_?" He grimaced at the window again. "Dave's planet was covered in fucking lava. You saying I should expect that in our yard next month?"

"Maybe if we lived in Texas!" she said with a grin, bounding to the closet. "C'mon, get dressed!"

"Why?"

"Becaaause," she groaned, "it's my first ever snow day! It's _your_ first ever snow day and you didn't even get to visit LOFAF before everything melted!" She pulled on a pair of knee highs under her nightgown. "You didn't have snow on Alternia, right?"

Karkat watched the window as if he expected the snowflakes to stab him in the back if he looked away for too long. "Alternia might have had a deadly sun, but at least it never had the gall to shit ashes on itself."

She rolled her eyes. "Karkat, snow is what happens when you mix precipitation with freezing temperatures."

"This crap is frozen rain?"

"Well at least you know what rain is." She grinned over her shoulder at him and he scowled in return.

She reached into the closet for his nearest outfit -- everything he owned looked the same anyway because trolls didn't like different clothes or having fun or something -- and tossed it at him before searching for a warm and easy to slip on outfit for herself. She settled for her black dress and pulled it on before he'd even finished buttoning up his jeans.

With a groan, she bounced over to yank off his sleep shirt and pull his usual shirt over his head as he swore at her. She kissed his forehead once it was through the neck hole and he fell silent mid-insult. They both leaned in to press their foreheads together, kissing softly as he pulled his arms through the sleeves.

There was something extra comforting, in her opinion, about sharing a silent moment with a boyfriend who normally didn't know the meaning of the word "silence." With snow muting the outdoors, it was almost as if the only sounds left in the world were the quiet smooches between them. She couldn't have lived with the jerk if she hadn't grown pretty fond of his noises though. She tugged the bottom of his shirt down, smoothing out the wrinkles, just to hear his growl.

After that, he insisted on brushing her hair as some kind of trade-off for trying to coddle him. (She bet it was just an excuse.) She wouldn't have minded under normal circumstances, as he was surprisingly gentle about getting knots out, but that morning he had to snap at her to stop squirming multiple times.

As soon as he declared her hair acceptable for public view, she snatched his wrist and dragged him to the back door, pausing only long enough to slip on shoes. She hoped they hadn't waited so long the snow had stopped falling.

A cold breeze shot into the house the instant the door was open and snowflakes hit her cheeks. She bounded into the yard and threw her arms out to catch the falling flakes on her sleeves. They stood out in strong contrast with the black fabric, melting after a short moment but quickly replaced by new ones.

Karkat stayed in the doorway, hunched in on himself and glowering at the snow with narrow eyes. "Oh my fucking god, I think it's warmer in our meal vault. If I jumped into a pool made of the ice cream that's sitting forgotten in the back of the freezer, it would still be warmer than whatever the fuck this is. Even Strider would stop trying to pretend he was cool in the face of this buttfuck cold."

Jade groaned. "Get out here, you whiny jerk!"

"Just because I have the sense to not give a shit about your planet's weird weather behavior-" He took his first step outside and yanked his foot back as soon as it touched the ground, staring down at the freshly flattened snow with wide eyes.

She couldn't help grinning. Even she hadn't been that startled by snow the first time she came across it. "But snow is fun, Karkat!" She knelt to scoop up a handful, patting it into a loose ball. Jeez, that was cold. She knew LOFAF was cold, but she'd forgotten it was that bad. "See?" She chucked the snowball at him.

He threw his arm up as if he was blocking a rock, even flinching when it hit and exploded into a light powder against his sleeve. He almost snarled but it calmed to his normal scowl as he examined the white specks on his shirt. His brow furrowed as the snow melted as soon as he picked it off. "What kind of pointless bullshit is this, Harley?"

"Well, I guess it is kind of pointless, but so are a lot of fun things!"

He twisted his arm around, trying to peer at the flakes without disturbing them enough that they'd turn to liquid.

"I can show you what they look like better!" Jade said.

He glanced up at her, his eyes still narrow, and she chose to interpret that as interest. She focused on a single snowflake tumbling down in front of her and used her Space powers to expand it until it was a good two feet wide, every intricate line in the beautiful pattern blown up for easy viewing. Karkat's eyes widened as he watched it strike the ground and break into soft pieces.

"These little pieces of shit all look like _that_?" he said, holding a hand out to catch a few falling flakes. "Who the fuck thought it was a good idea to carve intricate doily patterns onto ice so fucking small no one can even see it before it turns into water like a fucking tease?"

She couldn't hold down a smug grin. "Weeeeell, technically the creator of all things, including dainty snowflake patterns, is standing right in front of me, isn't he?"

He scowled, all curiosity lost in his usual grumpy expression. "Oh hell no, Harley. This frog was _your_ doing."

"With your help! And I'm pretty sure snow and most of this world was a carryover from the universe _you_ made!"

"Fuck it." Karkat huffed, his breath visible in the cold air. "You know which asshole really helped you with the frog breeding? I'm placing the blame for this pointless bullshit on Strider. That's his fucking specialty anyway."

Jade shrugged and dropped to her knees, scooping up a pile of snow together. "Okay, but I still think it's neat and not bullshit at all."

He finally wandered outside, flinching with each step as the snow crunched and flattened beneath his feet. "The fuck are you doing, Harley?"

"Haven't decided!" She patted the snow into a firm pile. "I'm debating between a snowman or a snow fort."

"If you expect me to believe for one fucking second that these useless ice flecks can seriously turn into a _man_..."

"Nooo, dummy." She quickly gathered together three snowballs and piled them on top of each other, gesturing at the finished product. "Like that! Except bigger."

He cocked his head, staring a long moment. "Humans have really fucked up notions of what they look like."

"A fort it is, then," she said cheerfully. That sounded more fun anyway, even if the snowman was an exciting tradition she would be sure to partake in later.

He snorted. "What's a snow _fort_ going to look like if a 'man' is three spheres? Are you going to shape it like a bone bulge and call it a day?"

"It's going to look like a house made of snow, Karkat." She smooshed together the mini snowman and pressed it into a smooth sheet, trying to make it stand upright against the ground. "I'm building the first wall now, see? If you want to stop being so cranky and close-minded about everything, you could come help me and have fun."

"I refuse to believe this activity could be classified anything as pleasant as 'tolerable,' let alone 'fun,' but," he knelt next to her, "if it'll get us back in the house faster, fine."

She smiled and bumped her shoulder against his. He bumped back, reaching into the snow. He drew back with a flinch as his fingers made contact, leaving small indents. With a stubborn scowl, he stuck his hands back in, his mouth twitching as the flakes caved over him, and clenched his fingers to press the snow together in imitation of Jade's movements.

She grinned and kept working, though her fingers were starting to go stiff from the cold. "When we're done building the fort, we should invite John over for a snowball fight, and we'll have a place to hide and he won't."

He grunted, adding more height to their wall. "And he'll blow all our work on top of us and we'll suffocate beneath a pile of frozen rain like a couple of useless bulgelickers, as is only appropriate."

She shoved a handful of snow against his neck and he let out a high-pitched yipe, his face turning red. He swatted the top of the wall at her, showering her in cold flakes, and fumbled for more ammunition as she smacked a snowball into his hair. He snatched a handful of snow and moved in closer, trying to shove it in her face as she leaned back, until they both lost their balance.

They toppled onto the incomplete fort, smashing all their work into the ground, but she really couldn't care, the same as she couldn't stop laughing. He'd fallen on top of her, but his warmth was more of a comfort than his weight was a bother, and she stared up at him with a grin.

White flakes littered his dark hair, melting almost immediately if they made the mistake of slipping onto his warm skin. His cheeks were still unusually red in the midst of all the gray. His bright red eyes met hers and she wondered if they were studying her the same as she studied him. He let out a deep breath and she noticed for the first time that he was shivering.

"Jade," he said, his tone plain instead of angry for once.

"Yeah?"

He shifted so he was almost clinging to her. "This is really fucking cold."

She frowned. "I think it's supposed to be that way."

"My fingers are going to break off in defiance and find a new home in the dirt if I don't get them out of the cold soon." His teeth clacked as he shivered. "My nose will either join them or declare mutiny."

She could relate just then, and she didn't remember LOFAF being quite so difficult to tolerate, but she'd done it before so she could do it again, right? "Don't be such a baby. You're always exaggerating."

He scowled. "Your face gets much redder and I'm going to question if the rest of your body has any blood left in it." He ran his fingers over her cheek and she flinched back. His fingertips were _freezing_. "Is it fucking normal for your skin to be as cold as this shitass snow?"

She wanted to argue, she really did, but she shuddered so hard her voice caught for a moment. That was probably a sign she needed to accept that she'd lost the argument. She'd survived LOFAF easily with just a fluffy jacket and leggings, but LOFAF had never made her fingers turn pink and stiff while she shivered nonstop. In fact, she was growing fairly certain that the Medium wasn't a good indicator of what Earth winter was actually like.

"Okay, fine, you win," she said with a sigh that had too many syllables thanks to a poorly timed shiver. "Let's go back inside."

"I'd be tempted to argue just to make you soak in your ablution trap filled with regrets and mistakes, but no amount of smug satisfaction is worth staying out here." He climbed off her and caught her arm to pull her up, for as little as she needed the help when she could just fly to her feet if she wanted.

They wrapped around each other, hiding their fingers in the folds of each other's clothing, and stumbled back into the house together. Karkat kicked the door shut behind them hard enough it slammed.

They collapsed onto the couch, curling up close. Jade grabbed the afghan flung over the back of the couch and pulled it around both their shoulders.

"Earth is hoofbeast shit," Karkat muttered, his teeth still clattering as he kept his arms wrapped around Jade's waist. "It's hoofbeast shit served on a silver platter with an extra helping of rotten musclebeast bulges covered in urine gravy."

" _Washington_ is hoofbeast shit. My island was always nice and _warm_ and I should have made everybody move there instead of letting my brother decide." She lifted her legs off the floor and shoved her feet between his knees.

He squirmed but didn't push her away. "The hell are you doing? Quit it."

"But my toes are killing me," she whined.

"My ears are about to fucking freeze off, but you don't see me trying to bury them in your lap."

She tilted her head. "Really? Mine are okay."

"Yours are covered in fur!"

"Oh yeah." She frowned and reached for his ears, wrapping her fingers around them and rubbing the tips. They really were cold to the touch. "Well. Now yours are covered in me!" She grinned.

She was fairly certain the flush in his cheeks wasn't just from the cold anymore. He tilted his head closer to her and adjusted his legs so they squeezed around her feet.

Even indoors, the air felt like it came straight off a block of ice. The afghan was tight around her shoulders, but the only places Jade felt warm were where she touched Karkat. She snuggled in closer against him half-expecting a protest, but he only returned the gesture.

Other than their faltering breaths and chattering teeth, the room was silent. She wondered if it was kind of romantic, cuddling in the quiet while it snowed outside, except she was too busy feeling cold to find much romance in the freezing air. She supposed Karkat would know.

"Maybe one of us should make hot cocoa," she said.

He buried his face against her shoulder. "Oh, fuck yes, that watered down garbage has never sounded like such a fucking godsend."

She nodded, trying to absorb as much body heat as she could manage, and wondered how long it would take before her toes stopped hurting.

"Are you going or not?" he grumbled.

She frowned. "Why are you expecting me to go?"

"Oh, I don't know. You're the one who suggested it? _You're_ the fucking moron who thought it was a good idea to jump in that shit like a think pan-damaged wiggler?"

She groaned, a little because he was being petty, but mostly because he was right. "Okay, fine." She wriggled out of his lap and the warmth of the blanket, already cringing in the cool air. She hadn't taken one step away from the couch when he caught her arm and pulled her back so fast she almost fell.

"No no no, I changed my mind, don't go!" He wrapped around her and she groaned but was mostly relieved to be surrounded by his body heat again.

She gave him a soft kiss and tried not to react to his cold lips; she could tell he was fighting a cringe as well.

They stayed wrapped up against each other until the numbness in their fingers subsided and the red in their cheeks faded to a reasonable pink. Only then could they mutually agree it was worth putting their feet on the floor again to make the trek to the kitchen.

Karkat didn't argue about who should stay and just went with her, making sure the afghan stayed over her shoulders. He kept his arms wrapped around her as she went about boiling the milk and setting up the cocoa powder in two mugs. She almost stepped on his toes more than once.

Once they each had a mug of steaming liquid chocolate in hand, they settled back on the couch. They stayed snuggled together, but they didn't bother tangling their limbs and clinging this time. Clutching hands was more than enough as the cocoa spread the last little warmth they needed to recover from their backyard misadventure.

Karkat rested his head against her shoulder. "Jade?" he murmured. Just then, his voice was the only thing worth having the silence broken.

"Yeah?" she whispered.

"I am _never_ fucking playing in Earth snow again, got it? You can't make, cajole, threaten, or force me; it isn't fucking happening."

She laughed and leaned her head against his. It wasn't worth arguing just then. They'd just save the snowball fights and fort building until after John showed them how anyone survived in weather as dreadful as winter.

**Author's Note:**

> This story has been fighting me since freaking November. I almost gave up on it a few times, but I liked some of the lines I already had and, pointless fluff or not, there's just not enough Jadekat to be had.


End file.
